Chapter 189 - 187: Hokage Building

'Poor Nawaki. He's going to be a henpecked husband one day, isn't he?' Azula watched the two of them: Nawaki's desperate apologies, Asuka's cold shoulder.

The flush on his face whenever Asuka so much as glanced at him was all the evidence Azula needed. The boy was doomed and didn't even know it.

Azula glanced at Tsunade. For all her tough exterior, Tsunade was a romantic at heart, she'd never admit it, but she watched Nawaki and Asuka the way someone watched the opening act of a play they already knew the ending to.

"I said I'm sorry, okay? Can we please not fight?" Nawaki's hands were clasped together like he was praying. He might have actually been praying. His voice had gone slightly shrill.

Asuka looked at Nawaki's clasped hands, his pleading eyes, his slightly shrill voice, and her expression curdled into pure disgust.

Then she noticed the courtyard watching, the Uzumaki elders, Mito, Tsunade, Azula. Her face went through a quick calculation: press the attack and look like a bully, or back off and look magnanimous.

She barely backed off. "Hmph, I don't want to talk to you."

"Alright." Mito's voice cut through the bickering with the gentle authority of someone who'd been managing family squabbles for longer than either of those two had been alive. "Let's go have breakfast, I assume everyone is hungry."

Azula nodded. Her day was already packed, and breakfast with a dozen Uzumaki relatives wasn't on the schedule. "Okay."

She caught Tsunade's eye on her way out. A silent exchange—I'll be back later and I know—passed between them in the space of a heartbeat, then she was gone.

•••

"Morning, Kawara." Azula found her animation director already at her desk, smiling like someone who'd just received excellent news and hadn't decided who to tell first. "Why are you so happy this early?"

Kawara had just settled in at her desk when Azula walked through the door, and she nearly knocked over her tea scrambling to stand.

"Morning, Azula!" Kawara didn't bother with formalities. She'd known Azula too long for that. "I'm so happy today I could scream. I love you. This is the best day."

Azula didn't take it seriously. Kawara was her mother's age, happily married, and clearly in the grip of some overwhelming good news. That didn't mean Azula wasn't going to tease her about it. "Oh? You're in love with me? What a pity. You're already married."

"Please don't joke about that." Kawara pressed a hand to her chest like Azula had just proposed something scandalous.

"My husband already thinks I work too much. If he hears I'm in love with the Hokage, he'll never recover." She paused, reconsidering. "Neither will I, honestly. You're a lot to handle."

Azula shrugged. "Alright, alright. Tell me what's actually going on before you explode."

Kawara exhaled, her grin shifting from theatrical to genuine. "Hisara visited me this morning."

"No headband or anything on her forehead. That ugly mark is finally gone."

"And her daughter won't have to wear it." Kawara's voice caught. "Hisara cried. You don't know, before, I was scared she might... I thought she might hurt herself, and now she's free."

"The Hyūga, efficient? That's a first." Usually that clan dragged their feet on everything. Last night's demonstration must have motivated them. "Well, the Caged Bird Seal is finished, the village won't see its like again."

"I believe you." Kawara didn't even blink, Azula did what she said she would do.

"I don't suppose you're here because your office got destroyed?" Kawara's teasing grin returning. "Because I saw the rubble, that looked expensive."

Azula wasn't surprised. The Kaleidoscope Tower was close enough to the Hokage Building that anyone with functioning eyes would have noticed the destruction, it wasn't exactly subtle.

"No." Azula shook her head, and something in her voice shifted. The casual banter was over. "I have new work for you, the most important project of your career."

Kawara's smile vanished. "Important work? How important?"

"Probably the most important work of your career." Azula didn't hesitate. "It needs to be fast, the quality must be flawless. I'll handle that part personally. And most importantly, I want that character to be immortalized."

Animation still relied more on her ninjutsu than technology. A skilled Yin Release user could project images directly from imagination into reality, the better the control, the more vivid the result.

And Azula had the Mangekyō Sharingan. If she oversaw the quality personally, the result wouldn't just be good, it would be unmatched.

She unsealed a scroll and pulled out a stack of paper thick enough to stop a kunai. Plot outlines, character designs, scene breakdowns.

"Take these." Azula placed the stack in Kawara's hands.

Kawara looked at the stack. Then at Azula. "You've been planning this for a while."

"I don't start projects I haven't already finished in my head."

Kawara flipped through the first few pages, and her eyebrows rose.

"A historical anime? That's new for us." She turned another page. "But if the rest is anything like this, it's going to be popular."

Azula didn't doubt it for a second. "Of course it will be. Alright, I'll leave this with you. I'll be back tomorrow to start the real work."

She was already turning toward the door. "I have something else to handle."

•••

•••

The Hokage building was already swarming with workers. Scaffolding clung to what was left of the walls, and the sound of hammers echoed across the site before Azula even rounded the corner.

It made sense, really. Training grounds got destroyed constantly, houses took collateral damage from jutsu practice.

The construction crews in Konoha had more experience with emergency repairs than any builders in the world. At this point, putting a Hokage building back together was just another Tuesday.

In this case, though, it wasn't just repairs. Azula had wanted to overhaul the Hokage building since the day she took office, something bigger, more impressive, more fitting for the administration she was building. She'd never had the time. Now, the destruction had solved that problem for her.

"Hokage-sama." Ishin bowed as Azula approached, his crew already scattered across the site behind him, measuring and marking and hauling debris. "We came as soon as we heard, is everything alright?"

Azula waved a hand.

"Don't worry about it, an accident happened yesterday. It's already handled." She surveyed the site. "I'm glad you took the job. I was hoping you'd be the one to take the work."

Ishin let out a short laugh.

"If not for you, our crew would have disbanded years ago. You gave us work when no one else would." He looked at the ruined building with something like pride. "Now we're rebuilding the Hokage tower, that's an honor.

She'd hired them for the Anime Theater, the Library, the Mangastore, the Justice Building. Each project had been bigger than the last, and each one had put his crew on the map.

Thanks to that track record, his crew had more work than they could handle. They'd done jobs in Kumo, in Kiri, even in the capital. But when word reached them that the Hokage building needed rebuilding, Ishin and his crew cut their vacation short.

Like a lot of people originally from Konoha, Ishin and his crew had come back after she took the hat. The village was growing, there was work to be done. And if Azula was the one leading it, Ishin wanted to be part of it.

She'd discussed the renovation with him months ago.

Azula's plan had been to wait until after she'd integrated her father's eyes, recovery time, a few weeks to months of downtime, and by the time she was back on her feet, the building would be done.

Ishin sighed, looking at the ruins. "It's going to take time. Even with my best crew, I wouldn't be surprised if this takes half a year. Maybe longer."

Azula raised an eyebrow. Half a year was longer than she'd like.

"Don't worry, I'll think of something." An army of undead construction workers, perhaps. Edo Tensei bodies didn't tire, sleep or complain about overtime. The idea had potential.

Ishin nodded. "In the meantime, your temporary office should be ready by this afternoon. Nothing fancy, I'm afraid, not what the Hokage deserves."

"I'll manage." She rarely used her physical office anyway. Shadow Clones handled most of the paperwork. The Hokage's desk could be a plank across two sawhorses for all it mattered.

They discussed a few more details, then Ishin headed back to his crew, already calling out instructions before he'd even reached them. His energy was almost exhausting to watch.

Azula shook her head. "People in this world are truly enthusiastic."

(END OF THE CHAPTER)

Honestly, this whole Mito arc is a breather before the next arc which is more you know, looking forward to. (Fucking African network, late)